The Dark
by DarkDexter
Summary: Three years ago Dexter Morgan gave up his murderous lifestyle, and sent himself into exile. His dark passenger cost him everyone he loved. Now what happens when he resurfaces and decides to start taking out criminals again. He's picked a new city to hunt in, but this city is something special. Another hero stalks criminals at night, but this hero doesn't kill his prey.
1. Chapter 1

CHOP! CHOP! CHOP! The noise of an axe against a tree. A group of lumberjacks chopping away at the trees around them. Our focus is on a single man who's chopping a good distance away from everybody else. The tree he's chopping at falls, revealing his face, his light hair and beard, his soulless green eyes, his expressionless face. He walks over to the fallen tree and starts hacking it into logs. CHOP! CHOP! CHOP!

A whistle is blown, alerting everybody that the work day is over. Everyone else stops cutting and starts to pack up and leave. Two men walk by him laughing with each other, they become quiet when they see the man still chopping wood. "You know the work day is over right? You can stop." The first man asks him. The second man continues "Yeah, you could come out to the bar with the rest of us for once."

He keeps chopping at the wood, not even acknowledging them. The two stand there for a minute waiting for some kind of response. "Well you don't have to be such a dick about it." The first man growls as they both turn around and leave.

The lone lumberjack stays until he finishes cutting up his wood, and then starts carrying it to his truck. After all of the logs are loaded he carries his axe into the cab with him and drives off.

He drives to his cabin in the woods, miles away from anybody else. He walks in, throws his coat down, and sits in his chair. The cabin is a small, empty room. It has a table, chair, bed, fireplace, and refrigerator. After a minute or so of chair sitting he opens up his fridge, only to find that it's completely empty. After looking at his lack of food his stomach growls, the first noise he's made in forever. He picks his coat up off the floor, and walks out of the house.

He drives down miles of dirt road through the woods before he comes to a town. He parks at a small grocery store and walks in. The cashier looks at him and she goes "oh you're back, you gonna be rude as usual?" He grabs a basket and walks off "guess so" the lady says.

He fills his basket up with sandwich stuff, and takes them up front. She looks at the content of his basket and says "five loaves of bread, six packages of bologna, and two bottles of mustard. fifty one dollars and thirty sevents cents, just like always." He hands her $52 and walks out with his bagged food.

He opens up his truck door and puts his bag inside. Out of the corner of his eye he can see a woman being strangled against the wall by a biker looking guy. He watches for a moment, almost looking unsure of what's happening. And then all of a sudden "you better get the fuck away from her!" His voice booms angrily across the parking lot. The biker turns around, still clutching her throat. "Who the hell are you?" Hs grabs his axe out of the seat and drags it towards him "it doesn't matter who I am..what matters right now..is that I'm not going to let you harm that innocent woman." "Oh? And I suppose you're going to chop me up with tha-"

CHOP! He swung the axe straight through the biker's face mid sentence. The axe embeds itself into the wall and the body slams to the ground. He falls to his knees, panting heavily as the woman runs off screaming. Welcome back Dexter Morgan, it's been awhile but I'm finally back.

First thought, don't get caught. I pull the axe out of the wall and throw it in my truck. I always keep a pair of gloves in the glovebox and a tarp over my wood. I walk over to the body and get ready to wrap it. Before I start wrapping hm I realize that the store clerk must have heard what happened, I need to hurry.

After wrapping the body I pick him up and turn to put him in the truck. I throw him in the back and throw some logs on him. I start the truck and start to drive home.

I haven't killed in 3 years and I'm feeling really excited. I haven't I even thought about killing since my 'death'. I already know what to do with the body. There's a small mountain near my cabin, the side facing away from my cabin is prone to avalanches.. What do I do after him? I have no idea yet, that's the exciting part.

I park the truck outside the cabin and run inside. I open a cabinet and grab a couple trash bags and head back outside. I feel tingly, I haven't dismembered a body in so long. I gently pull him out of the bag. Usually I'd take a trophy by now but I don't need those things anymore. I pick my axe up out of the cab, and. CHOP! CHOP! CHOP!

It feels good to be back. This time things are going to be different though. I'm not killing to kill, I'm killing for good.


	2. Chapter 2

Now the only question is where do I go from here. It needs to be somewhere full of murderers, but not just normal murderers. In New Mexico a meth cook is making a name for himself, he's killed before but..his victims weren't exactly victims. Cross New Mexico off the list. In Springwood, Ohio teenagers have been dying off in there sleep for a years now, but I don't think there's a killer, there isn't enough information to mess with it. New York has a killer going around massacring whole gangs, me and him have similar ideas so he's safe. The most tempting place is Japan, but again it's criminals dying, thousands of them though. Japan is crossed off.

I've spent the last few days digging up information on murderers that are running free, and I keep crossing places off my list. Most places just blatantly don't interest me. I wanna take down people who have as many innocents as I have guilty, people who are still walking free because they can outsmart or kill all the cops in their way. And in my search I have across a place full of people who fit into both of these groups.

Gotham City, famous for it's corrupt police force and criminally insane. Another interesting thing about this city is the one who watches over and 'protects' it at night. I am of course referring to Batman, a very interesting man. He's credited with saving the lives of all the Gotham citizens, but at he's directly responsible for the deaths of thousands. He has his own code that consists of one rule, he will not kill. It is because of this rule that the criminal scum are able to run amuck and do as they please. Yes Gotham City, you and I will get along nicely.

Now that I have the location, I need a cover life. I still have a contact that can get me all the legal documents I need, I.D.'s, passports, birth certificates, and such. Now a job, something that won't cause attention, something where I can interact with people and that anybody could do. I should work at as a cashier at a LexMart,, perfect. It doesn't single me out as some kind of smart guy and I can gather intel easily through human interaction.

I take out the burner phone from the box in my wall, put there for this very reason. "Hello?" My contact picks up the phone. "Hello this is Dexter, and I need a favor."

 _Meanwhile in the City of Gotham the Bat closes in on Joker's newest plan._

I sat above the alley looking down at the exchange. For the past few months Joker has been gathering weapons, I don't know what his plan is, but Harley's about to lead me to him. Harley and her goons step out of the car, and then some goons step out of their van. They open up their van doors and pull out, holy shit it's a nuke. I have to find out who Harley's getting weapons from, and where they get them. No more waiting I have to act now.

I jump down to the alley below me. _BAM! POW! WHACK!_ Just a handful of goons with bats, not allot of effort required. Harley charges at me with a gun in her hand as the van speeds off. I grab her arm and head and slam her into the wall, knocking her out. I run off towards the van while taking out the batclaw and use it to attach myself to the bumper.

I jump upward and push the retraction button, the batclaw pulls the cable and I land on the back of the van. I climb up to the roof and punch a hole through it. The driver slams on the brakes and I roll to the side of the van. The door bursts open and the driver begins to shoot at me.

I jump to the side and throw a batarang at his hand forcing him to drop the gun. I roll towards him, grab his throat, and slam him into the side of the van. "Who are you working for!" I lighten my grasp on their throat so that they can speak. "I ain't saying shit Batman!" he spits on the ground in front of me. I knee him in the chest three times then spin around and throw him to the street. "You're going to tell me everything! Or I'm going to break each and every one of your bones!"

"Go ahead, you still can't stop it. We knew that you were watching us, we knew that you would follow me." They must be planning on blasting the nuke! I knock the man I'm talking to out. I grapple up onto the rooftops and run atop them, back to the nuke. Joker's down there messing with it, He's alone, Harley's still knocked out. Gotta act fast, get Joker away from the nuke.

I throw a batarang at him and jump down to the alley. "Oh Bats how nice of you to join the party, it's too bad that none of the other guests are here to greet you." "Can it Joker." I grab him by the face and smash his head onto the ground, knocking him out.


	3. Chapter 3

Just arrived at my new apartment. The first thing to do is get set up here, and at work. I hope to start killing within the next month, I just need to make a list. This won't be like Miami though, I need to be careful, better plans than usual. Take Bane for instance, or Killer Croc, or Poison Ivy, or Clayface, or any other super powered freak.

I'll look more into things later, but right now I need to get set up. I need to appear to be normal so I don't arouse any suspicions, I need an emergency bag, need to get my job, and then I can start making my list. First thing on my list, groceries.

 _Meanwhile in the GCPD_

"So do we have any leads as to where Joker was hiding his weapons?" I ask to the officers in the briefing room. "No Batman there's no clues as to where they are and no one's talking to us about it, there's no indication of him using any of his known spots." The officer leading the briefing replies. "And the van driver?" I add. "Still being interrogated, hasn't said much so far just the normal crazy shit." I stand up "keep questioning him, inform me if he says anything of interest. Joker went down way too easily, he has to have some sort of master plan in place."

I walk out of the building and get into my car. "Batman." Oracle's voice shrieks in my ear, push the button. "What is it Oracle?" "Multiple bodies matching Zsasz's M.O. has been discovered in an apartment." "Multiple?" "A family of four, mother, father, son, daughter." she explains to me. That makes 18 victims in two weeks "send me the address" I'm taking this bastard down.

The engine roars to life. I speed off through the streets, weaving through cars until I reach the apartment. Some uniforms are already there but the lab techs haven't. I walk in to see the bodies, family of four, slit throats, dinner still on the table, with them still sitting there. This is Zsasz alright. "Oracle. I need a map pulled up with Zsasz's victims on it." I have to find out where he's held up, and what he's planning on doing. "Here you are Batman, what are you thinking?" "He's been inactive for months, now all of a sudden he kills 18 people. I wanna know why."

The map I'm staring at has 14 dots on it, they're all spaced pretty far from each other. Up until now they've all been one victim, now four victims. What's he playing at.

 _Meanwhile Dexter gets to his new home from the grocery store._

Food, water, killing tools, I have all the essentials. I step out of the truck taking the four bags with me. I freeze, what are all these cops doing here? There's no way they could've tracked me here. I continue walking inside. There's the police tape of an active crime scene, detective and forensics shouting about what it means. I look closer, looks like four victims. An entire family slaughtered as they try to enjoy a meal. This is why I moved to Gotham.

"Keep moving along sir." An officer outside the tape says to me. "I'm sorry, I'm new in town. I just moved in next door. What happened to them?" "I'm under strict orders not to release any details about the murders. Move along sir." He says to me in a stern voice. "But I might be danger, I live right next door. Can you at least tell me who you think's going around killing people?" He ponders this question for a moment, and then he leans in to whisper. "It's not a hundred percent confirmed, but Batman's looking for Victor Zsasz."

Batman, what a joke. Spends every waking hour 'protecting' Gotham but can't save any lives. Hundreds, no thousands of people have died because he's too much of a coward to act. I hope to meet him during my stay in Gotham. But back to the issue at hand, Victor Zsasz. I've come across that name while researching Gotham's criminals. Hundreds of victims, can't be sure of the exact number, a mark on his body for each of them. Those are his trophies, soon he'll be one of my trophies.

I nod to cop "thank you. I'll call the station if I see him." I slip back into my apartment and sit my bags on the table. It looks like there's a murderer in town. Isn't it ironic, my first day here and there's death right next to me. Looks like after I put my groceries away I get to start the hunt early.


	4. Chapter 4

What a wasted night. I've been in the batcave all night and haven't accomplished anything. There isn't any clues on Zsasz anywhere. The van driver doesn't look like he's gonna talk. Penguin sells weapons, but would he have a nuke? It's the only lead I have so I guess it can't hurt to talk.

"Sir, hungry?" Alfred asks walking up with a tray of food. "Not now Alfred, I'm gonna pay Cobblepot a visit." I stand and start to walk to the batmobile. "What's Penguin got to do with this?" "Maybe nothing, maybe everything." I say before I speed away in the batmobile.

I shut the car off a block away from the Iceberg lounge and grapple to the top of it. Cobblepot's getting into the back of a limo, he appears to be talking on the phone. The limo starts moving, I follow along the rooftops. As soon as It's out of sight of Penguin's goons I jump down onto it, and climb in through the sunroof.

The driver and the other two guards quickly draw their guns on me. I wrap my arm around the driver's wrist, then jump up and kick the guns out of the two, kicking them in the face coming down and knock them out. I squeeze the driver's wrist until he drops his "roll up the window and keep driving." I say sternly, I see him look over to his boss who nods in approval, and so I drop his wrist.

Penguin sits his phone down "ya know Bats, you don't have to hurt my henchmen." he says as he pours himself a glass of wine "you could just call and schedule an appointment next time." "I need answers Cobblepot." "I'd be happy to oblige you Batman, ask away" he says, sipping his wine. "Did you sell it to Joker?" "Did I sell what to Joker?" He asks, as if he has no idea what I'm talking about.

"Did Joker get the nuke from you?" He looks at me, with terror on his face "The Joker has a nuke?!" He really has no idea what I'm talking about "Had, I stopped him before he could use it. But my fear is who ever got it is going to continue selling them." "I can assure Batman, I did not sell a nuke to The Joker. Gotham is my home Bats, you should know that. I can make a few calls, see if I can see who did." "Call me the second you find anything, even if you think It's nothing." I stand up to leave but then sit back down."

"Think of something else?" I had just used the cowl to scan his car and can see into his trunk. "What's the 50 caliber in the trunks for?" He looks at me, disappointed that I found it out. "It's for a, a client.." I lean in and stare at him menacingly "who." "Alright, I'm on my way to deliver it to Deadshot." "I'm going to take it from you." "No Bats you can't do that!" He yells at me "yes I can, and I'm going to." He smirks at me "you know I can't help you find Joker if everyone hears that you found me and let me go." He's right, I guess I gotta let him keep it "you're right" I tell him "but wait three days before giving it to him, tell him there were complications getting it." "Alright Bats." The Penguin reluctantly agreed, and with that I grapple through his window.

"Oracle" I say pushing the button on my cowl "I'm coming over to you, we need to find Harley."

Meanwhile at Dexter's apartment.

I've spent the whole night doing research on this Victor Zsasz, and I'm kind of impressed. His body count seems almost superhuman. He easily has more than twice as many kills as me, I'll have to count when he's on the table, not that I'm jealous or anything, I've never been caught.

He's been on the street for months, and now that he kills 18 people everyone's finally looking for him. His victims don't seem to follow any pattern, on a map they aren't even near each other. However they've all been single victims up until now, which make me think he's gonna start killing more people faster. This man, Victor Zsasz, so crazy, so murderous, so unpredictable. This is going to be one of the most challenging hunts ever. I accept this challenge.

I'm gonna have to put it out of my head for now though. I gotta get ready for my job interview. My morning process is basic, and ritual, shower, shave, dress, eat. Ritual, I've missed that so much. Everyone needs a ritual, a pattern, it helps to keep us grounded and on task.

I get into the car and start it. I'm only 3 miles away from the LexMart I plan to work at. It's just LexMart though, and they have my I.D. and stuff already so I'm pretty just going so I can answer a couple questions.

Traffic, without it getting to work wouldn't take 20 minutes. I lean to the side and look ahead out of my open window. There's a van parked horizontal on the road. I can see the man in the driver's seat yelling at someone in the back. The side of the van opens up and I barely have enough time to duck before they pull out a machine gun and start firing into traffic.

I open my car door and hide behind the truck in front of me. I slide to the left a little bit and take a closer look. I don't recognize the driver, but by his scared reaction I'd say that he's a hostage, I look over at the gunman and It's the mother of all coincidences. Victor Zsasz, just the man I was looking for.

Zsasz continues to gun down everyone who he sees moving, adding marks as he does so. I walk along the side of the truck and slide to the car in front of it. I open the back of the car and take out a baseball, I stand up and pitch at Zsasz, hitting him in the gut, just in time to stop him from shooting someone. Zsasz turns his gun in my direction I quickly throw myself back down as a haze of bullets sprays at me.

There's eight cars between me and the van. I think that I could take him but I don't wanna take the chance. That's when I remember the spare needle of m99 in my glovebox. I rush over to my car and grab the needle.

"Come out come out wherever you are, Batman!" Zsasz chants as he scans the area for me. Does he really think I'm Batman? Good that means he hasn't seen me, doesn't know where I am.

I sneak alongside the vehicles until I'm in front of the van. I grab the passenger door handle and the driver screams, alerting Zsasz of my presence. "Oh Batman it seems you've given me your location." Zsasz runs around the side of the van and points his gun at me. "You aren't Batman, who the hell ar-" before he can finish his sentence I spring up, kick the gun away, and jam the needle into his neck. Victor Zsasz then falls limp on the ground.


	5. Chapter 5

A room covered in plastic, a motionless soon to be corpse strapped to a table. My hand brushes over the knives lying beside him. Victor Zsasz, the man on my table, and by far the most ruthless killer I've encountered. The marks all over his body, a mark for each victim. I counted the marks on him before I put him on my table. I wish there was room on the walls for the pictures of all his victims.

"Wake up sleepy head." I whisper to Zsasz as I crack the smelling salt open near his nose. "Where am I? Who are you?" He struggles to turn his head and face me, but he's wrapped too tightly. "You're in an abandoned casino, strapped to my table. I thought it made sense, you threw your life away in one of these so I'm gonna end your life in it." He starts to laugh at this remark "you aren't going to kill me ha haha ha haa. Because you see, I'm already dead. Hahaha haha ha ha, and so are you." I spin the table around so that he can look at me. "No you aren't dead, not just yet. But your 639 victims are dead. You are here to pay for these people's lives." He stops laughing and stares at me, normal people would probably be intimidated by the look on his face, but no one ever accused me of being normal.

"Victims you say. I liberate the zombies from having to live on this earth. Do you know how meaningless and empty it all is. All of these so called 'victims' these 'people', they are not living, they are simply hollow zombies. They need cleansing, they need saving." I lean in and speak to him softly "You're right, life for people like us is meaningless and empty. They do need saving. But what you're doing isn't saving anybody, you just wanna feed your urge to kill. You're just a psychotic murderer who should've been killed long ago."

I take a step back and pick up a slide and a small knife. "So tell me about the marks you make, what are they for?" I ask Zsasz. "Oh yes, my tally marks. Well we both know that life is dark, empty, and meaningless and that we are all soulless zombies walking around, waiting for the sweet, sharp relief of my blade to wake them up from this lifelessness. However I am not an exception to this rule, and after I've ridden everyone in the world of their pain I will do the same to myself. The marks are to remind me of that, that I'm still a zombie, that I still feel pain." I turn around once more to look down at him "And the four on your head? Where's the fifth?" "That ones a very special one. It is reserved for Batman."

I crack a smile and run my blade through the four tally marks and place his blood on the slide. Zsasz's eyes burst wide open, he begins to scream and hiss at me "Who do you think you are depriving me of my special tally mark!? I'm gonna get up and cut your fucking head clean off! And then I will mail that head to Batman! That mark will be the mark of your death!" I sat the blood slide down into the first spot of my new box "no not my death, your death" I say as I pick up an even bigger, sharper knife.

I stand over Zsasz as he continues to violently shake and scream, desperately trying to get up and kill me. "Look at you. Struggling just like all of your victims must have struggled. How does it feel Zsasz? Knowing that you just became my victim." I ask him as I bring my blade up. "I am not a victim! I liberate the z-" I cut him off before he can finish. "You're right Zsasz you aren't a victim. Victims are the innocent ones."

The moment the knife touches his skin I feel a wave of adrenaline goes through me. I look Zsasz in the eyes as the life drains out of him. The last word Zsasz can force out is "zombies" as he chokes on his last breath. I sit and revel in my newest kill for a few minutes. I stare at Zsasz's lifeless corpse lying there. My life's starting to feel like it did in the good old days.

 _Meanwhile Batman arrives on the crime scene._

I drive up and park next to the van. Traffics backed up a couple of blocks, bodies everywhere. "Batman, over here!" The cop in charge yells at me. I jump out of the batmobile and walk over to him "what happened here?" "From what we can gather, Zsasz has this van, he kidnaps this guy and forces him to drive it" he points to the man in the back of his car "then he parks up here and sits for twenty or so minutes, the van opens up and he fires."

"Do you have any idea where Zsasz is?" I ask him. "Well according to the perp somebody grabbed him." he answers. "I'd like to question the witness when we get back to the station." He points over at another cop and motions for him to come over "Jeff will be taking taking him back to the station for you Batman. Feel free to look around before you leave though." He tells me, and then walks off.I take a minute or two to walk around and search for clues. The gun was found outside of the van, it seems to be some sort of prototype for the military. Whatever it is it was able to gun down 36 people through their cars in mere seconds. There's no sign of Zsasz or of a struggle, if he was taken it was by a professional. There's not allot to go off of here. I walk over and jump into the car, I have a witness to question

 _Meanwhile at a lake on the outskirts of Gotham City._

While I was researching Gotham this place kept popping up everywhere, and I decided that it'd make the perfect body dump. This place already reeks of death. Camp Crystal Lake, known locally as Camp Blood, the site of over 200 murders within the last 60 years. Legend has it that some psycho in a mask runs around hacking people to pieces.

After I finish hacking Zsasz up into pieces I stuff them into trash bags with rocks. There's a rowboat tied to the docks that I use to paddle out to the middle of the lake. Victor Zsasz, by far the most murderous man I've ever come across.

I watch as his body parts sink down to the bottom of the lake. The one thought I have on my mind is who's gonna be the next to go on my table.


	6. Chapter 6

"So just stock all the shelves up for today" my boss tells me before walking away. It's my first day of work over at LexMart, and I already can't wait for it to end. There's already another man wrapped in plastic, unconscious, just waiting for me to punish him. I picked him up early this morning when I was watching the Iceberg Lounge. I recognized who he was, watched him leave with a lot of firepower, and so I took him.

Now I remember how much I hated work, not that it's that bad, it's the waiting around that kills me. It's not like he's gonna get away or anything though. He's gagged and tied down so tight that he can't even move. Still, six hours goes by pretty damn slowly when you have business to take care of.

Still though the work day is eventually over and I get to clock out. "Be here again at 10 a.m. tomorrow!" My boss yells at me as I walk out the door "will do."

After the work day I jump in the car and race over to my next kill. There's no traffic, nice, peaceful drive. I walk into the room and see that my prey is already awake. "Well hello Julian Day, how are you feeling today?" I walk over and pull the gag out of his mouth. He stares up at me in silence. I walk over and pick up the smaller knife and slice his cheek. I pick up the slide and fill it with his blood.

"Well I guess I'm the April Fool then aren't I?" Julian speaks to me as I clutch the bigger knife. "Oh so you do know how to speak?" He doesn't reply to me, instead he looks around at all of the calendars I taped up around the room. Each calendar has a date circled, and next to each date there's a description of his murders, and pictures of victims. "Your mom, your dad, the woman you loved, an entire family. These are only a couple of your victims." Julian looks up, smiles at me "you bring up nothing but happy memories sir, I love being around loved ones for the holidays. And after today I'm going to get to join them up at the Thanksgiving banquet in the sky."

I slowly bring my knife up. He stares at the tip of the blade "it's just too bad that tomorrow's April Fools and not today." I swiftly plunge the knife down into his heart and we lock eyes before he falls dead. I set the knife down and pick up my power saw.

 _Meanwhile on the rooftops of Gotham._

"Stop! Please!" A man yells as the two thugs approach him. "We want the money" the thug holding the bat says. "You can have it, just please let me go!" He yells again as throws them his wallet. "Not your money you idiot! We know you work for goddamn bank!" The second one yells as he pulls out his pistol and points it at the man's head.

I'm on the building directly behind them. I leap over and grab the bat from the thug's head, knock him away with my elbow. I hit the second thug with the bat handle throwing him forward and causing him to fire a shot at the air duct. The first thug backs up and charges towards me, I send his bat hurling at him and it knocks him out. I then take the second guy by the neck and slam his face down.

I help the man up and hand him his wallet, he thanks me and then leaves. "Batman?" I push the button on my cowl "yes Oracle?" "I just got a call from an anonymous source saying that they know where Joker's weapons are, I'm sending you the location." Finally some sort of lead "alert the police about two thugs on a rooftop on my current location. I'm checking the address out now."

I grapple upward, jump off, and then glide down to the location. The building is an old abandoned warehouse of some kind. I wipe away the dust on the sky light and see a group of assassins moving boxes around and loading them into a truck. I jump off of the building and sneak around the side to the back entrance.

I walk in and crouch behind a crate. They must be loading Joker's weapons. So is the League of Assassins working with Joker? I count five of them.

One of the group walks over and grabs the crate I'm behind, so I grab his head and jump up, doing a flip, and slamming his head on the ground. The other four drop what they're doing pull out their swords and charge me. I sidestep there slashes and grab one of their wrists. I twist behind him and he drops his sword. A sword comes at me from behind but I deflect with my arm and kick him in the chest sending him stumbling back. I throw the guy I have a hold of into the guy in front of me. The fourth comes at me from above so I grab the sword of the ground and block with it. I hit his sword away, grab his leg, and slam him on the ground.

The other three jump up and circle around me. The two to the left and right of me charge at me and the one behind me jumps upward. I jump up into a backflip and with both feet kick him the chest throwing him away. I kick the other in the face and land on his chest, pinning him to the ground. The last one standing stabs at me and I dodge it, and then grab his wrist and pull his head into the other guy's, knocking the both of them out.

Just as I start to stand up the doors burst open and the building quickly fills with assassins. Ra's Al Ghul walks in behind them "well hello Batman" he says to me "I guess you found my little warehouse." The assassins all clutch their swords' and get ready to charge at me. "You will not stop my plans this time." Ra's slowly backs out of the building and the door slams shut.

 _Meanwhile outside of the Iceberg Lounge._

A limo just pulled up outside of the Lounge. I watch as the door opens and a man climbs out, Oswald Cobblepot. I watch as Cobblepot walks inside the building. In a couple of minutes I can see him sit in his desk through the window. I watch him as he sits at his desk and yawns. I can see him pick his phone up when it rings.

I get out of my car and climb a pipe up the side of the building and perch myself next to his window. "Yes, yes I have the rifle. It took a couple more days gettin' it than I thought." He pauses and listens to the guy on the other side of the phone call. "Yes I know when and where to go Lawton" he pauses one more time "oh so you changed the damn plan. Where at in Crime Alley are you staying? And at 4:30? Alright." He hangs up the phone.

I jump down from the window. So at 4:30 huh? I guess if I set the room up before work I could grab him after work. Now who was he talking to? He said Lawton, could it be Floyd Lawton? He said he's delivering a rifle so it makes sense. I get into the car and drive away. I better get some rest, I have two more targets.


	7. Chapter 7

"Sir, sir, sir!" Alfred's cries in my ear wakes me from unconsciousness. "Yes Alfred?" "Oh thank heavens master Wayne, you had me worried. I've been trying to talk to you for a while. Master Drake is on his way in the batmobile. Are you alright sir?" I slowly climb to my feet, covered in cuts and scrapes from last nights battle. "Yes Alfred I'm fine, just had a run in with the League of Assassins and slept on the roof."

"The League of Assassins? What are they doing here?" "I don't know but it's something big, they were loading weapons from Joker's stash." "Do you think that Ra's Al Ghul is working with The Joker?" I bring my arm up and push a couple buttons on it "I don't know yet, but I bugged the truck they were using and sent the coordinates to the batmobile."

In a couple of minutes Tim shows up in the batmobile. "Hey Batman you look a little rough, you ok?" "I'm fine" I say as I walk to the back of the car and start changing the plates on my suit "had a little run in with Ra's Al Ghul." He jump out and walks over to me "anything that I can do to help?" "The Penguin has a 50 caliber rifle that he'll be selling to Deadshot today, leave Penguin alone but arrest Deadshot." I tell him and then jump into the batmobile "alright Bruce" he tells me as he grapples away.

 _Meanwhile at the Iceberg Lounge._

I despise waiting in traffic while I have a man in my crosshairs. Damn Batman speeding through the streets with his batmobile, not caring about common decency. I barely make it to Lounge before his limo pulls out of the parking lot.

I follow the limo, I wanna figure out where Floyd Lawton is while I'm here. I stay a lane over and couple of car lengths like I'm supposed to. Everythings going good until I notice a man running along the roofs out of the corner of my eye. I watch him and see the color red on him, so it must be Robin. But how many of those have here been, 8? Batman, Robin, Joker, I hate not knowing who people are.

If I noticed him I bet that he's noticed me tailing Cobblepot. He could be after Oswald, Lawon, or both of them. He won't take my pray from me, if anything I'll use this needle on him and beat Oswald unconscious. I better take a different turn than the limo next time, throw Robin off of my scent.

I take a left turn and drive straight until I find a parking lot to park the car in. I'm gonna have to go the rest of the way on foot, I can't let Robin see my car again. So I guess it's time for a change of plan. The kill rooms in an abandoned house on Crime Alley. I'll have to just watch what goes down and then act.

I get to Crime Alley just in time to see Floyd jump down from a rooftop and walk over to Oswald. I crouch behind a nearby abandoned car and watch the exchange. The two banter for a little bit before Oswald's goon opens up the trunk, pulling out the rifle and 2 crates of ammo. I begin scanning the area looking for Robin. I notice him perched on the roof above Floyd. I watch him throw what I assume is a tracking chip on his rifle when he hands over the money, afterward he grapples out of sight.

I stay down low as I start to sneak over to the limo. When I get to the limo I pick up a piece of glass and stab it into the tire. I roll behind the dumpster as the henchman opens Oswald's door as he steps in. He starts to walk to the driver's seat when he notices the tire.

"Sir we appear to have popped one of our tires." He says to Oswald "well then I suggest that you change it." He replies rather rudely. The man just nods as he opens the trunk and takes out the spare. After he gets started changing it I crawl out from behind the dumpster and sneak into the driver's seat. "So have you finished changing that bloody tire yet?!" He shouts at me impatiently. I take out my needle and turn to face him "not quite sir" I say as I plunge the needle into his neck.

"Yes sir I just finished!" I hear his man yell from outside. I quickly turn the key on and hop into the back seat, sneaking out of the door. He runs over to the driver's seat to check what's wrong and sees Oswald knocked out, and then when he turns around I knock him out with a four way.

 _Meanwhile with Batman._

"Hey it's Batman, get him!" one of Harley's men yells after he spots me. All five of her men raise their guns towards me. I throw down a smoke bomb and retreat backwards but a group of assassins block me off. I run towards them and jump, kicking off one of them, and attack from behind.

The smoke clears just in time for me to see Harley jump in the truck and speed away. I look around very quickly and seem to have lost sight Ra's. I only have an instant to scan however as the goons begin firing wildly at me. I duck behind a dumpster but the assassins keep slashing at me with their swords. The group attacks all at once and I bring my arms up and grab the blades of four swords. I snap the blades in my hands and bring my arms down smashing the rest between the plates of my suit.

I coordinate my attacks to keep me out of the line of fire. In just a minute or so I have all of the assassins taken care of. Harley's men continue their attack on me. I grapple upward to a nearby roof and they continue to shoot. I raise my arm up and push a couple of buttons. The batmobile pulls up to the ally and shoots it's beanbag gun at the men, knocking them out.

After they're all taken care of I jump down and cuff them all. "Alfred" I say as I push the button my cowl. "Yes sir?" "Alert the GCPD of the criminals on my location, they're subdued and need picked up. And do you have heard from Robin?" "No I haven't master Bruce, last I heard he found where Deadshot was hiding but I haven't heard from him since then." "Do you have an address?" "Yes, sending it now."

"That won't be necessary Alfred." I hear Tim's voice on the other end of the com. "Oh master Drake you had me worried, why didn't you check in?" Alfred says to him. "Falty coms unit, I'll look at it later."

"Did you get Deadshot Tim?" "No I didn't Batman. He got me in the chest with the 50 cal and threw me out his window, I lost track of him." "Are you hurt?" "No I'm find, the suit might need to be cleaned though." "I'm on my way to the bat cave."

 _Meanwhile in Dexter's kill room._

"Hey, what's going on here?!" Cobblepot yells up at me as I break the smelling salts. I ignore him as I run my small blade across his cheek. "Hey!" He yells angrily "do you know who you're messin' with?! You better let go or i'll-" "What will you do Oswald? You don't have any power here. Isn't that what matters to you most, money and power?"

"Money eh? So that's what this is. Well you won't get any of it from me I tell ya!" I turn away and fill a blood slide with his blood then squish it together. I raise it up and look at it. "Do you really think that I'm after your money?" "So you aren't money? What is it then? Guns? Information? Are you looking for the Joker as well? You'd be the third guy to ask me about him." I smirk and shake my head. I set the slide down and grab my bigger knife.

"Wait a minute then, what do you want from me?" He asks me. "Do you know how many people that you've killed? Giving guns to whoever pays. Julian Day, Floyd Lawton, Joker. Do you know what they intend to do with these weapons?" "What do I care what they do? It's their money and their weapons. It's not my fault what they with em'

"Oh but it is Cobblepot. You see, that's why you are here." I say as I lift the knife up and plunge it into his chest. In his last few moments he decides to spit a bloody lugey into my face. "You gross bastard." I say as I wipe it off of me.

It takes just under half an hour to reduce Oswald to a couple of trash bags in the trunk. It's not much longer until I'm back at Crystal Lake. I fake the bags out of my truck and set them in the rowboat. I take the rowboat out to the middle of the lake and toss the bags into it. I lay back and look up at the sky. It's a beautiful day to be alive.


End file.
